{"id":6617,"date":"2024-01-28T18:23:20","date_gmt":"2024-01-29T00:23:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/spectator.cuchicago.edu\/?p=6617"},"modified":"2024-01-28T18:23:20","modified_gmt":"2024-01-29T00:23:20","slug":"concordia-university-wisconsin-and-ann-arbor-leaving-concordia-invitational-tournament","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spectator.cuchicago.edu\/?p=6617","title":{"rendered":"Concordia University Wisconsin and Ann Arbor Leaving Concordia Invitational Tournament"},"content":{"rendered":"

While this weekend marks the 71st annual Concordia Invitational Tournament (CIT), two of the four participating universities are pulling out of the annual weekend of basketball games.
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Concordia University Wisconsin and Ann Arbor announced on Dec. 20 that the school will stop participating in the basketball tournament that includes Concordia University Chicago and Concordia University Nebraska.
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\u201cAfter the 2025 CIT event, slated to be held at our Ann Arbor campus, CUWAA will discontinue participation in this tournament to pursue new traditions that better serve our athletic programs and engage our student body,\u201d said Erik Ankerberg, the president of Concordia University Wisconsin and Ann Arbor, in a statement.
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Concordia University Wisconsin and Concordia University Ann Arbor merged in July 2013, but each school fields separate athletic teams. Both universities operate under Ankerberg, who was the provost at CUC from 2020 to 2022, and the associate vice president for academics from 2017 to 2020.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWhat makes athletics at CUC distinctive \u2014 and what stands out about CIT \u2014 is its spiritual grounding,\u201d wrote President Russell Dawn in an email to the students and faculty of CUC. \u201cThat is what will endure as we determine how we will honor that tradition moving forward.\u201d<\/p>\n

CUC\u2019s Athletics Department did not have any prior knowledge of this decision. The leadership will be having further meetings with all the other schools while at CIT, said CUC director of athletics Janet Wolbert.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSince the news, we have been looking for alternatives with Concordia Nebraska,\u201d Wolbert said. \u201cThey also want to try and keep the tournament going.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The weekend-long tournament is played between CUC, Concordia University Nebraska, Concordia University Wisconsin and Concordia University Ann Arbor. Men\u2019s and women\u2019s basketball compete, as well as dance, cheer and stunt. Pep bands and mascots are also present.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a little surprising,\u201d said men\u2019s basketball head coach Rashaan Surles. \u201cEspecially with the history and importance that comes with CIT and also because all the players truly enjoyed the tournament.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

The location of the tournament rotates each year between the four schools in the competition. This year it was held at Concordia University Wisconsin, in Mequon, and it is scheduled to be held in Ann Arbor in 2025.\u00a0 CUC would have been the next host school in 2026.
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\u201cI am saddened by the news,\u201d said sophomore Gabriel Lopez. \u201cEspecially since we were supposed to be the host school after CUAA, and now we won’t be able to experience it at our own school.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

While this weekend marks the 71st annual Concordia Invitational Tournament (CIT), two of the four participating universities are pulling out of the annual weekend of basketball games. Concordia University Wisconsin and Ann Arbor announced on Dec. 20 that the school will stop participating in the basketball tournament that includes Concordia University Chicago and Concordia University […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":66,"featured_media":6624,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6617","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/spectator.cuchicago.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6617","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/spectator.cuchicago.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/spectator.cuchicago.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spectator.cuchicago.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/66"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spectator.cuchicago.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6617"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/spectator.cuchicago.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6617\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/spectator.cuchicago.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6617"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spectator.cuchicago.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6617"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spectator.cuchicago.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6617"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}